Blaxploitation Movies

Blaxploitation is a film genre that emerged in the United States in the early 1970s when many exploitation films were made that targeted an audience of urban black people; the word itself is a portmanteau of the words "black" and "exploitation." Blaxploitation films were the first to feature soundtracks of funk and soul music. These films starred primarily black actors.Variety magazine credited Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song with the invention of the blaxploitation genre. Others argue that the Hollywood-financed film Shaft is closer to being blaxploitation, and thus, is more likely to have begun the genre.

When set in the Northeast or West Coast of the U.S., Blaxploitation films tend to take place in the ghetto, dealing with hit men, drug dealers and pimps. The genre frequently takes place in an atmosphere of crime and drug-dealing. Ethnic slurs against whites (e.g. "honky"), and negative white characters like corrupt cops, politicians, prostitutes and easily fooled organized crime members were common. Blaxploitation films set in the South often take place on a plantation, dealing with slavery and miscegenation.

Blaxploitation includes several types of films, including crime (Foxy Brown), action (Three the Hard Way), horror (Abby), comedy (Uptown Saturday Night), nostalgia (Five on the Black Hand Side), coming-of-age/courtroom drama (Cooley High/Cornbread, Earl and Me), and musical (Sparkle). The primary quality of the Blaxploitation film is the targeted marketing to black audiences with the use of exploitable elements such as a black cast and subject matter of interest to African-Americans.

Following the lead of Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, many of these films featured funk and soul jazz soundtracks with heavy bass, funky beats and wah-wah guitars. These soundtracks are notable for a degree of complexity that was not common for radio-friendly funk tracks and rich orchestration that included uncommon instruments such as flutes and violins.